Economic Development Authority Meeting   8/16/2022

All right.

So new business.

So I'm going to turn it over to J.T.

Roger is not present at this meeting, so J.T.

is going to be subbing for him.

Yeah, thanks, Mr.

Chair.

A quick moment to recognize that two new EDA directors have been seated.

We have Matthew Lawless from the Scottsville District and Jeff Morrill from the Samuel Miller District.

We had an opportunity to, as staff, to

conduct an orientation, myself, Deputy County Executive, Doug Walker, Assistant County Attorney, Richie DeLoria and Megan Gray and I were able to go through some of the highlights of Project Enable.

It's never enough time.

There's just a lot of stuff, a lot of information to cover, but I think we had a really great discussion and we're excited that they're bringing

their strengths to the authority.

And Mr.

Can we take the screen down so we can see faces?

I'm sorry to interrupt J.T., but it's nice.

Yeah.

So welcome, Matt and Jeff.

We appreciate you guys joining the board.

We look forward to meeting you in person probably at our next meeting.

So, Matt, you want to go ahead and maybe introduce yourself really quickly.

Thank you, sir.

My name is Matt Lawless.

I'm seated at the Scottsville Town Hall.

My day job is as the town administrator in Scottsville.

I have 10 years of local government work experience from Winchester to Charlottesville towards Roanoke area all over Virginia.

The degrees behind me are from William & Mary for undergrad and American University in D.C. for a master's degree.

Public service is my career and supporting our local economy is an important part of that in Scottsville and in the whole region.

Some of my favorite local businesses are the tubing outfitters in town can often find me on the river, the shops that sell running shoes and other sporting equipment, and some of our gaming companies.

It feels good.

Thank you very much.

Glad to be of service.

Thank you.

Welcome, Jeff.

Oh, great.

Thank you.

So I'm a native of Blacksburg and a graduate of Virginia Tech.

And after that, I moved to Boston, spent 20 years there building businesses.

And after 20 years, my cavalier wife decided she was ready to come back to Virginia and to Charlottesville.

So that was 2018.

And now I work from home and travel back and forth.

And my experience with local government is basically limited to

showing up hand in hand at meetings and asking for permission to alter our facilities or do that kinds of things.

Well, great.

Well, welcome.

I was especially happy to hear that you're a native of Blacksburg because so am I.

So welcome.

We appreciate you guys joining us.

We actually have a fair amount on the agenda today, so we'll keep going.

Yeah, just a quick note to say that the Board of Supervisors received an update on the Southwood community back in April and the EDAs, the action before the EDA tonight is approving the payment for meeting certain milestones within the performance agreement.

And so that's included in the meeting materials for the EDA this evening.

The materials ahead of time are attachment 4A and the resolution is attachment 4B.

And I believe that our representative from Habitat does have a presentation or at least some words he'd like to share ahead of that consideration.

Welcome, Dan.

Thanks.

Certainly.

Thank you.

Thank you, J.T.

Thank you, Don, for inviting me.

I'll try to keep it really quick to give you a little bit of an update on where we are in terms of meeting the standard or the milestones as part of the performance agreement.

And then just a very, very quick update on where we are on Southwood.

Let me share my screen again.

Yes, great.

So won't bore you with all the details, but especially for the new members of the authority board.

Welcome, by the way, Matt and Jeff.

We our work at Southwood is part and parcel of our larger scale work to create mixed income neighborhoods and affordable home ownership in the region.

We were a pioneer in this.

We were the first Habitat Nationally to do it.

And we were in the first

in the country to do mixed income neighborhoods.

We've now done 10 mixed income neighborhoods in the area and built almost 300 habitat homes in those neighborhoods.

Additionally, that work intersects with our work in helping the most vulnerable residents of Albemarle County.

That's folks who live in trailers who don't own the land underneath their trailer.

There are 20 million people in the United States who live in trailers but don't have a right to their land underneath them and every day they are evicted somewhere in this country and that is happening almost, it's happening certainly here in Albemarle County as well.

In 2004, we found a group of families in the Belmont-Carlton area who had found that their land had gotten sold out from underneath them and they were given a couple of months to move.

There's nowhere for them to go, so we stepped in and bought the contract from the developer.

and worked with residents to create a vision.

And Sunrise today is a neighborhood of front porches and back porches and open space for the community to use.

To our knowledge, it's the nation's first mobile home transformation without resident displacement.

And that sort of set us up for Southwood.

In 2007, the residents of Southwood came to the owner of the park and asked her, she was Jenny Sue Minor, who was gonna sell the park on the open market.

At that point, it was about 100 acres in the growth area.

of the county asked her if she would consider selling it to Habitat, and she did.

We purchased it in 2007.

It was a mess, to be honest with you.

There were fires, trailers catching on fire, sewage bubbling up into people's trailers through their commodes.

and it's large.

It's on an enormous scale.

Right now we were able to, with the help of the county, we're able to append a 32 acre parcel adjacent to the mobile home park, but it's large.

And we have gone about doing our work at Southwood the way we did at Sunrise.

We promised non displacement to all the residents who were there.

So in response and in partnership, the County Board of Supervisors passed a resolution in 2016

endorsing a collaborative relationship between the county and Habitat.

And then follow that up.

In that resolution, it talked about high quality affordable housing, employment opportunities, increased tax base and reduction in demand for county services as a rationale and a reason for the partnership.

The county generously followed that up in 2019 with a performance agreement, which is why we're here today.

It overall is about $3.2 million of funding, 1.8 coming from the general fund, 1.4 coming through a TIF or a tax rebate.

Our deliverables in the first phase, this is not for all of Southwood, it's just the phase that's currently under construction, our 75 affordable homes.

And our milestones are multiple, we had to,

meet milestones in terms of submitting for building permits, getting a low-income housing tax credit apartment under contract, and importantly for today, meet some fundraising milestones.

So we had to, I think, I believe raise 95% of the cost to build.

This is just the bricks and sticks of the homes in that first phase.

And we've exceeded that.

We're at about $22 million.

We completed a $15 million capital campaign.

Additionally, we're overperforming that performance agreement by quite a bit in that first phase.

Per the performance agreement, we promised 75 affordable homes.

In the first phase alone, we're building 207 affordable homes.

We've been working really hard.

More importantly, the residents have been working really hard side by side with us in 2019.

They moved forward form-based code for the area of land that's adjacent to the trailer park.

with the idea being that we can develop there first, move people from their mobile homes into there and then move through the site.

The form based code was important because the residents come together as cohorts in their individual villages and they literally design the villages.

And so this is what's under construction right now.

This is the first village and it's beautiful.

The residents just knocked it out of the park.

It's surrounding a central park with the soccer field.

Don, I know you will appreciate that.

There's places for seniors, Habitat homes next to market rate homes, it's going well.

Importantly too, one of the things that's included in there that I thought y'all would be interested in is that we are piloting with the county a new definition in the zoning code that's a flex unit that can be used as an affordable rental, but it can also be used for people to continue to run businesses like they're operating businesses right now, but unsustainably out of their trailers.

and in addition there is a neighborhood commercial center as part of the first phase with about 10,000 square feet of commercial in it although thus far that is not leased up except for a couple thousand square feet as a early childhood education center.

What's important is that as village by village the residents will come together and design their own neighborhood

And we're rolling.

Our first two homes at Southwood, if you haven't been out there, are 95 percent complete.

We have penalized the first two accessory dwelling unit structures.

So again, in this deal, we'll sell the home and the flex unit to a Habitat family, include that in their mortgage payment, and then they can run their business or house extended family or borders in the apartment.

We've got about $12 million invested already in site work in the first phase and we've done about $2 million worth of environmental remediation.

The good news is that the area that we're developing is pristine.

We've been working closely with the county inspectors and DEQ and so that area has been restored and we're building on top of that.

Currently in the middle of zoning, hopefully at the final stages of rezoning the rest of the trailer park, which is the actual trailer park itself.

We're in front of the Board of Supervisors on September 21st.

It's going to be a little bit more challenging from here on in, but we've got a plan for that where basically what we'll do is we'll develop an area

move people from their trailers into that area in a new mixed income village and then we'll do it village by village until we're through the project.

We'll probably be building in south until about 2035.

As part of phase two, we're planning a business incubation center in a little bit neighborhood downtown.

Some of the uses we're trying to attract are a shared commercial kitchen, a business incubation center, a cafe,

Early Childhood Education Center and potentially some other non-residential uses such as a credit union.

We're also proffering discounted sale of a school site, an urban scale school site, so that that could become, if the county wants it, that could become another hub of activity.

and we're working on upgrading the failing infrastructure of the mobile home park now, even ahead of redevelopment to clean up the site, even as we're transforming it.

So when Southwood's done, it'll be somewhere between 1000 and 1100 homes, up to 700 of them will be affordable, depending on subsidies that we get, how things develop.

About $160 million directly invest in affordable units.

These are just bricks and sticks, not land.

There's about 500, when you add up all the money being spent to develop Southwood, it's about a $502 million direct investment, which equates to, we believe, a couple of billion dollars of economic impact locally.

And importantly, it's really important to note that Southwood, unlike Greenfield's developments, there are already people living there.

So right now, the sum total of taxes being paid to the County of Albemarle

through a combination of personal property taxes and real estate taxes about $140,000.

The exact same people are going to be paying 700, I'm sorry, $850,000 post redevelopment.

Much of that will be absorbed in the mortgage.

So Habitat will be subsidizing that.

So there'll be an annual net increase without any additional impacts from the people who live there in taxes of about $710,000.

Hint, hint.

if we want to get to talk about future TIFs.

And that's really the update.

I know that was quick.

I'm happy, again, I appreciate the grant.

I appreciate all the work and support of county staffers.

Not very much of a preview.

You all gave me an opportunity to speak today.

Thanks, Dan.

I appreciate that.

No, we usually just ask questions and then...

Just acknowledging the extensive work that went into creating the performance agreement in the first place.

For those of you who were here then, you know, Diantha in particular, I know, of course, Dan himself, it was groundbreaking for us.

There was not much precedent for us to work with.

It did require not only heavy negotiation between Habitat for Humanity and the county, but also involving the EDA because we had not, didn't have much experience using the EDA as a mechanism by which then that we could actually

accomplish the performance agreement using the synthetic tax agreement financing.

So we talk about it now as a success when we talk to the EDA about using that mechanism for other types of projects.

And we have, and you have, the EDA has been very supportive.

I think that through this, the EDA and the board of supervisors have

have gained a lot of confidence in how effective that this can be as a tool to help build a good community.

But Daniel gets first to say that, okay, we talked about being successful, but he's still right in the middle of it.

It's also real to acknowledge that there aren't many examples we can kind of point to and say, oh yeah, that's exactly where it has worked.

Maybe Willow Tree, Willow Mills, but even that was a little bit different.

So this is still a work in progress.

It is absolutely working.

And it's just worth calling that out to the directors.

since this has had such a kind of a long on-ramp or off-ramp on-ramp.

I'm not sure which way we're going, Dan, but we're certainly moving down the road with it, but it is successful.

So I do want to kind of just acknowledge the perseverance on the part of Habitat and the part of the board and the part of the EDA and helping this be a successful model for this development and for the future.

Diantha?

Yes, thank you.

And let me lower my hand so I don't forget.

Diane, would you explain a little bit or just talk a little bit about the school site and the offer to the school system?

I know that certainly the school in that area is pretty much, we're very overcrowded.

And I'm sure there are lots of children that will be coming out of this development.

Certainly, thanks for the question.

It's complicated.

It's a very complicated back and forth we're having with the county because we do want to offer a school site.

There are a number of real positives and then there are a number of potential hurdles.

First on the positive side is that we do believe that a school site will fit nicely in Southwood.

Education is really important to the residents and it's absolutely needed in the county as your own data shows you.

Some somewhere in the southern district or southern neighborhoods.

Here are some of the headwinds is that we don't have a 20 acre site.

to produce because if we did that, there simply wouldn't be enough, there wouldn't be space to put Southwood residents and to create enough market rate units to cross subsidize the affordable part.

And so we're asking the school system to take a little bit of a leap of faith and do something a little different, which is to think about urban scale school in the growth area.

So we're proffering a seven acre parcel rather than like a 20 acre parcel.

we also have worked with a designer and designed a two and a half level school that fits on site inclusive of the surrounding play areas and stuff like that the amenities the other piece that's a little bit hard is that unlike most proffers we are we are not offering to give it away we just simply can't the in the 500 million dollar

the cost of Southwood the by far the largest contribution filling up the bucket is market rate lot sales and so if we were to give that away you know we would lose tens of millions of dollars of lot sales which cross subsidize the affordable what we have done is proportionally

offered a discount that the school would like to purchase it so that they can purchase it.

We'd get an appraisal, establish the fair market value, and then give a proportionate discount off that.

We also have changed our proffer from the Planning Commission meeting such that we will produce a pad-ready site.

We'll do all the development work pro bono, free of charge.

just materials only, materials and sub-labor only.

So whether the county will accept it or not, that's our offer.

I don't know whether the county will accept it or not because it's a little bit unusual.

And then I guess should this be accepted as a proffer, then the county will have some decision to make, I guess, whether you want to start in the Northern area, the Southern area, whether you want the Southwood,

Neighborhood First School or not.

Yeah, it certainly would be, it would be the board supervisor's decision to accept it as a proffer when it comes to the board next month.

There is ongoing dialogue between the planning staff and the school staff about the viability of this site.

for their plans and so that we can be in a position to be able to share with the board of supervisors whether this is a viable site or not.

So I do know that those conversations are ongoing.

That's probably the only thing that I would add, Dan, otherwise I think that you characterized it okay.

Seven acres is the minimum that we understand from the schools that can be used.

They do have other seven acre sites, including the site up in the Brookhill area.

that they are actively looking at for the new elementary school for the northern feeder pattern.

So yeah, so this is, it's playing out kind of in real time almost, right, a little bit more than a month from now, and we'll see kind of how it happens after that.

Yeah, and to some degree, and I realize the proffers we have to accept, but at this point, it is a scam.

through Elmar County Public Schools.

And I just was curious, Dan, has there been any discussion because I know you're providing a site for the Boys and Girls Club and I don't know a lot about that.

Was there any discussion about the Boys and Girls Club sharing a facility with the schools because that's certainly a model that's been out there before.

I would love nothing more than that for that to happen.

I've seen models of that that I think are among the most useful and well used and equity based, you know, equity causing or creating

facilities in the country that actually do that and it's a great use of space.

The Boys and Girls Club is a cherished member of the community.

They serve 200 kids and there's no reason to have two spaces that are identical when their hours are actually opposite of each other and so

In my heart of hearts, I'd love to see what we have done, Diantha, because so much of that's out of our control.

We've proffered that the county basically has until 2027 to make a decision and break ground on it.

So the proffer basically holds open the door so that the schools division, the Boys and Girls Club, the board of supervisors, you got some time and space to make that decision.

Great.

Thank you very much.

I appreciate it.

Oh, yeah.

Thanks.

I think we discussed this before in some detail, but I'd love to hear again about the ongoing plans.

The non displacement pledge, of course, really hasn't been tested yet because you haven't been able to move any of the residents out and into the new affordable units as best as I

Thank you.

It's a great question.

And yeah, it's one that that we we work on every day.

So a couple of things that the place where it has been tested is the first mobile home park transformation that we did where 100 percent of the people who wanted to stay stayed.

Non displacement is maybe a little bit of a, we can't force anybody to stay.

What we are doing is offering 17 different housing types, literally 17 that so there's a range of affordability, rentals, homeownership for every single person who's there.

And so and a

commitment to rehouse everybody on site should they choose to stay.

But we can't force people to stay.

Thus far, it's playing out pretty well.

We have the first village has forty nine homes and all forty nine homes are called for.

And this wasn't a question of us saying, OK, you have to choose or go.

We just said, hey, who wants to do it?

And so we were sort of waiting to see whether there actually was going to be the enthusiasm.

And and thus far there's one hundred percent.

Basically everything that we're building in the next year, everything that we've got in for building permits has been selected by a family at Southwood.

And I'm just curious about the hurdle besides wanting to stay, what's the other hurdle that the families need to go over?

Well, there's no financial hurdle for them staying because everybody, our promise, and it's backed up by a federal requirement, is that there's affordable units for everybody on site.

Not one.

We are, in addition to building and selling the homes, we're also the mortgage originators.

These are early commitments you're getting, Dan.

For purchase, there are a handful of folks who are in one of the sections adjacent to the construction site who have had to move prior to redevelopment because of failing septic systems.

And so those are folks who have chosen to rent.

So there are going to be between eight and 14 or so affordable rentals in the first couple of villages.

Yes, Mr.

That's a great motion.

Thank you.

All right.

Any further discussion?

Hearing none.

Let's do roll call.

Yep.

Director Ray?

Aye.

Director McNaughton?

Aye.

Director Mottola?

Aye.

Director Lawless?

Aye.

Great.

All right.

Thanks, Dan.

Appreciate you coming.

Thanks.

All right.

Next on the agenda, a grant match for the National Endowment of the Arts Power Bridge program.

J.T., you want a full introduction here?

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

This item comes as a result of a partnership with our Office of Equity and Inclusion.

Before the first director of that office, Siri Russell, left for a job with the UVA, she connected us with this opportunity, this grant match opportunity for a national endowment of the arts grant that would result in furthering some of economic development's interests in placemaking activity along the Broadway Street corridor.

And so I'd like to welcome

Welcome Jay.

Thanks for joining us.

Thank you all.

Thank you for giving me some time and also thank you for giving us the opportunity to be supported.

And the endeavors that we are trying to go about with these creative

I think a very creative and impactful project that is being headed by a artist, Marisa Williamson, who comes out of, she's moving from the East Coast, Philadelphia, but is teaching at UVA right now.

And the idea of the project, which is titled Unsettling Grounds, is a project that uses some experimental methods to try and create monuments and create works for and by Black, Indigenous, and low-income artists and trying to find ways of supporting them in their artistic endeavors.

And so the project is really about trying to imagine what is a monument and where do these monuments live in our landscape, both seen and unseen, and to do so by investigating history that's very central to Charlottesville and Albemarle County.

And to do so, we are imagining that this project will use augmented reality.

So folks will be able to walk around an area and it looks normal.

and then you pull up your phone and you'll see this new artwork that's been created by an artist that imagines and shows something that wasn't seen there on the surface, right, but shows something about the history, about a narrative that engages about, you know, unsettling

and reimagining what a monument can be and showing it to the public.

This idea has been done by Marisa Williamson and another project as well in Philadelphia called Sweet Chariot using augmented reality and you could go on a walking tour

of different murals in Philadelphia, and you'd put up your phone and it would show this whole new sort of engagement that you could go into and really explore aspects of history that maybe you didn't hear about before.

And so I think that's a really important aspect of the project, but I think also really ingrained in it is this idea of supporting artists

and making sure that that support doesn't just end with this project, but it's sustainable.

And so the bridge has partnered with Marisa to really begin thinking about what that will be.

And so we want to begin to use this program and the eight artists that we will be commissioning to make these works as only a starting point of a prolonged and sustainable project.

Program to give access to studio space funding for artists that identify themselves as Black, Indigenous, or low-income within the county.

So we're really excited about this endeavor.

We just have launched the first, you know, the open call, which is up online.

It's unsettlinggrounds.com.

where you can see everything about the project.

You can get an idea of what the heck augmented reality is if you're only used to normal reality.

And then you can also share the open call with anyone that you know that may be interested that doesn't matter what kind of artwork they do.

It's really nice because the project is really just asking artists to come forth with a creation.

And then we've partnered with Dream Syndicate

which is a developer that will create the sort of augmented reality platform.

And so there's this kind of nice back and forth conversation happening with the arts, with technology that I think is really exciting.

and that the bridge is really looking forward to partnering with Marisa and having more conversations about how to make that a sustainable conversation and outlet for artists past this project.

Yeah, so one question, so the technology part of it, is that already in place?

Like it sort of exists that, and what the grant funding is the part you just mentioned taking the

developing the art and making it virtual and putting it in.

Yep, so the funding will allow us to give artists stipends and then also, yes, to be able to develop the augmentation of reality.

Then also, you know, there's a desire to have some like exhibitions and like,

Okay, thanks.

Are there other questions?

It's an impressive project.

Yes.

So I believe right now the call just went up and will last until September 23rd.

And then we are looking to announce the eight artists by October 7th and having the first meeting with them by October 22nd.

And the artists will be meeting, are gonna be required to have like these sort of

in studio monthly meetings where we get to kind of work with them, see what's going on, have community and conversation.

And that will happen between October and June, 2023, at which point all of the assets, all the art will get digitized and sent out to Dream Syndicate.

And so I think the hope is that

But I think, you know, with all the creativity and everything, all those things can flex a little bit.

Things can get done earlier.

You know, it just depends on what people want to create, right?

Anything else?

Other questions?

All right.

I believe we have a motion.

And just to be clear, so the

There's a $25,000 grant from the NEA and our grant of $5,000 would match that.

Sure.

Well, so this is a matching grant.

The grant we're about to vote on is matching.

Okay, great.

All right, so is there a is there a motion on this resolution?

Yeah, real quick.

That answered my basic question about funding, but I'm still not clear whether those two matches and is it five thousand also from the Office of Equity and Inclusion?

to go with our 5,000, is that correct?

So the office of equity inclusion is giving us a match of 25,000.

I see.

And so our five thousand, it sounds like it may not have anything to do with a required match, but it helps you round out your budget for this.

I believe it is to help us round out our budget but to be I'll just total honesty I come into this position right after many of these sort of conversations have been had so I come in just slightly late

to the conversation.

Literally, I've been in this job for five weeks.

So I would say that I believe that it's helping us round out the rest of our budget.

But I can check in with Marisa.

Any of the staff?

I'll lower my hand now.

So in drafting the resolution, I did ask for supporting documents and back in, it looked like about a year ago, there was a request for the county and particularly the Economic Development Office to indicate its support for providing $5,000 in matching funds to the National Endowment for the Arts grant.

So based on that, we're operating from the position that

The $5,000 is required to match the NEA grant.

I've also seen previous projects similar to this one, working with the bridge, and welcome to the neighborhood, Mr. Semple.

It was my pleasure to work with two previous directors at the bridge on public art projects.

off and on over the past 10 years and I've been very impressed with the Bridge's ability to deliver high quality public art which continues to improve and I'm seeing more and more innovation from them and it tends to be a high turnover business as artists and their leaders move around and share their skills all over the country.

and I'm impressed with the Bridge's ability to keep momentum and continue to do better things.

They've kept this institutional memory and kept these projects going through the staff turnover, which in small nonprofits can be hard to do.

And I would just add to what Matt said.

I have worked, Jay, with the Bridge on several art projects as well, several mural projects and a hydrant project over the years and have

One coming up, I hope, at some point around transit.

So I really appreciate all of your all's good work.

And it's been a pleasure.

And my community in the Jaguar District is loving the art.

Yeah, of course.

I appreciate that.

Anything else?

All right.

All right.

All right.

I do.

Director Ray.

Aye.

Director Shreve.

Aye.

Director Lawless.

Yes.

Director McNaughton.

Aye.

Director Mottola.

Aye.

All right.

Thank you, Jay.

Thank you all.

Hope to see you around.

All right, we have another grant match for Go Virginia Beacons Shared Use Kitchen and Incubator, Yolanda Errol is going to be joining us.

Yes, thanks, Mr.

Chair.

This is the result of another partnership with the Office of Equity and Inclusion.

We were connected with Yolanda Harrell with New Hill Development Corporation about the opportunity to provide matching funds towards this Go Virginia grant.

The city's Economic Development Authority also participated.

in providing matching funds for this grant.

The total grant amount was $189,000.

Welcome, Yolanda.

Thank you.

I appreciate the opportunity to be able to share with you this evening.

And so do I have permission to share my screen?

Yes.

Okay, thank you.

Let me see if I can get this right with the little screen and presentation mode.

So I'm with New Hill Development Corporation.

We are a local nonprofit community development corporation.

Are you all able to see my screen?

Okay, thank you.

So New Hill was formed in about 2018, and we have a vision to expand economic opportunities that redefines wealth for a thriving Black community.

That is why we exist.

In 2019, we did a community vision plan for the Star Heel community area.

and as part of that visioning process, part of what we did is we had a lot of conversation with entrepreneurs and so part of what went into that project was this idea in terms of an outcome of creating a business incubator and so of course then 2020 hit and what we saw was

A tremendous need for why an incubator would exist, not only for Black businesses, but for businesses in general, specifically businesses that are in the food industry.

So one of the things that we asked ourselves was, what if

We could find a way to reduce financial barriers, to create at least 94 new jobs, help stabilize existing businesses, increase revenue streams for local farmers, add more diversity to the local food economy, and all at the same time supporting about 70 businesses at one time.

And so the answer to that, we thought, yeah, we can do that because it has been done in other communities.

Sorry, my slide doesn't seem to be advancing.

There we go.

So what we decided we would do is create a shared use commercial kitchen.

It's a concept that is growing across our country.

There is a small one that exists here in Trinity Episcopal Church.

Now, one that I have personally used.

And so, but what we did is during the time of the pandemic when we had

opportunity to kind of focus on what was going to be our next steps.

We did some investigation with other incubators around the country to see what they were doing and we talked with one in our local region as well as a nonprofit that was out of our region to get a better understanding of how they worked and what they did and their ability to support so many businesses at one time.

But the main thing that you want to understand about a shared use commercial kitchen is that it's a fully equipped facility that helps to support the startups of new businesses.

It helps to remove restrictive financial barriers.

It helps to reduce the risk of failure as a result of startup, especially when

You live in a community like ours that can tend to have very expensive storefronts, whereas there in other communities where you have a lot more urban sprawl, you may tend to have lower price points for storefronts.

And then of course, it allows for us to be able to increase the amount of specialty foods that exist as well.

Some common types of businesses that you would see supported in this type of facility would be like catering businesses, food trucks, existing restaurants, bakeries, meal prep businesses, or any business that are, anyone that is wanting to develop a value-added product because that is what we're seeking to offer.

Some things that, some features that are important to know about this type of facility

is that it will have multiple workstations.

That's how it's able to support so many businesses at once.

The plan that we've drafted would have a total of 16 workstations.

The facility is available for access 24-7.

and four of those workstations are in isolation rooms which helps individuals that are doing some type of product like a gluten-free product or something that they want to ensure that it remains nut-free or if there is some type of religious need for it like halal or something like that that would allow for them to be able to cook that in an isolated area to ensure no contamination.

But also, you know, it will have professional grade equipment, access to freezer, cold and dry storage areas, proper sanitation equipment, and of course specialized equipment that they might need that they otherwise might not have access to on their own, and of course loading dock for receiving and distributing product as well.

Part of what we hope to see with this type of environment is that when you are able to have an existing business working alongside a new business and especially an existing business that really is tenured and has a lot of

a lot of industry knowledge.

We're hoping to see that this creates a lot more innovation that will happen throughout the community.

So Beacon's Kitchen, we're gonna be a fully, we're building a fully equipped shared use commercial kitchen and incubator for rent on an hourly basis or a monthly membership.

You know, you can think of it like a WeWork or a gym membership where everything that you need is there.

You show up and you do what you gotta do and then you leave and you just pay your fee to participate.

How does this benefit the county?

Essentially it lowers the barrier to entry for new entrepreneurs, which of course promotes the ability to stand up more diverse businesses throughout the region.

It also helps, we also will

We have developed a food business training program that has already begun, but it will continue and we will be able to incubate businesses, especially Black-owned businesses, that are new so that they can be more sustainable and that they can eventually move out into brick and mortar locations and they're actually ready for that once they leave the incubation space.

Existing businesses that are currently in the county can utilize the facility to drive and promote various revenue streams such as catering, wholesaling, or even adding value-added products, which some businesses already have that, but now we are bringing them a way to do it locally instead of having to drive out of the area or to work with an organization out of the area to be able to have those products.

And of course,

Local small farmers can store and process food to be sold out of the kitchen as well because we will again have the storage spaces of not only dry storage but the cold and the frozen storage spaces as well.

And of course this is also going to have a significant economic impact on the area, on the local economy through construction, job creation, and of course taxable revenues.

and our goal is to help promote the increase of higher paying jobs as a result of this.

I shared with, I'm not sure if you all received it, but I did share with Roger a report that we had done by the Weldon Cooper Center as to what the local economic impact would be for this project and it definitely shows a significant impact and so hopefully you had a chance to review that.

In terms of the grant itself, we applied for the Region 9 Go Virginia grant, which we were awarded the grant.

The grant award itself was a total of $189,000.

This particular grant, as I'm sure you're familiar with, does require that we do work with at least two localities as a part of getting the grant, which we did partner with the city and of course with the county of Albemarle.

Although we are partnered with the university as well because this is state funds and they are state funds, they were not allowed to count the work and efforts that they're doing to support us.

So not only did they give us cash, but they're also giving us some project

Management Support as well for our project.

And just so you're aware that to date we have a total of $800,000 committed to the project.

So I wanted to try and keep that short, sweet, and simple for you.

Any questions for Yolanda?

Thank you.

Ms. Harrell, thank you very much.

I have thought about this concept before in the region, and I love to see it here as a reality.

I also think you found the perfect location that's easy to get to from different points of the county.

If it were smack in the middle of the city, I would be a little more hesitant about how accessible it would be to rural businesses, but I think your location's perfect.

Well, I will say that we are fortunate that one of our board members, Hunter Smith, who owns Champion Brewing Company, was utilizing this space.

And so we set up a succession plan for it to transfer from him to us without going to the open market.

But also the owner of this space, Charlie Lewis,

He tends to kind of fly under the radar, but he has also been very easy to work with in trying to make this transition happen.

So the main eligibility criteria will be if one, if you can either be an existing business, the kitchen itself does not have any respect to demographics in terms of your background, but we are gonna want you to be ServSafe certified.

We're gonna want you to have, especially if you're gonna operate your business out of it.

I'm sorry, you moved around on me, so thank you babe.

If you are operating your business out of it, then you need to have a business license.

But you don't have to be licensed, of course, in the city.

You can actually be licensed in the county and still just utilize the city.

So like, for instance, Hunter with Champion Brewing Company, he owns a host of businesses both in the city and in the county.

And he plans to utilize the facility for his businesses.

as a way to consolidate his prep work that needs to happen for all of his restaurants so that he can support, especially as we all know that there's a challenge right now with staffing.

I have a question.

And that is, you talked a lot about the shared space.

Can you talk a little bit about the incubator aspect of it, like the additional support that you're going to provide beyond what's just the

Absolutely.

And so we've actually started our food business bootcamp.

We started that our first cohort of that in April of this year.

And what that does, so we work in conjunction with we're not trying to reinvent the wheel here.

We've have CIC, which is a great organization that does that entry level training for

for new entrepreneurs, and there's other programs out there, SBDC also has a program, and of course there's individuals that have gone through universities that have given them training in entrepreneurship, but what we found is that there weren't many folks that were coming to the table

Ready to start a food business that actually had training in how to run a food business.

And so we partnered with Culinary Concepts AB, which is a team of chefs.

And so we put together a curriculum, we wrote that together, and we put together a program

that not only allows for individuals to learn about the operations of a food business and what does that mean but also we have a uh it's a six-week boot camp program and so we meet two nights a week first night is all about business second night is all about cooking because what we're also doing is giving them time to spend with actual chefs that had our season

that can give them pointers and tips and give them feedback on their food and their recipes.

They can help with recipe development, help with understanding food costs, those sorts of things that are very critical for individuals that are starting a new business.

Because what we found is that during our research is that most of the folks that

that had started businesses, especially black owned businesses, were individuals who had never worked in a commercial setting, but they had a dream and they had a vision and they wanted to get started in a business.

With this, what we're seeking to do is help them get started in a way that doesn't risk their financial future, gives them an opportunity to get started.

The other things that we're going to be supporting them with is marketing and bookkeeping.

because as we were seeking to support entrepreneurs during the pandemic, especially with helping them get PPP and EIDL loans, so many weren't able to take advantage of those things simply because they didn't have their financials in order, they didn't have their books properly set, and then for those that needed to shift and to really pivot what they were doing during the pandemic,

They didn't have the necessary marketing to be able to do that.

That's great.

Those are all good things.

I do know from having represented restaurants over the years that the ability to make good decisions about the recipes you're doing in terms of the cost.

And I mean, you can be a great chef, but if you're spending crazy amounts of money and producing your food, it's hard to make money doing it.

And that's a real key.

So I'm glad to hear that y'all are working with them on that and the bookkeeping aspect of it, because it sounds like really good programs.

Thank you.

Anything else?

Ms. Harrell, you mentioned that there was a safe food handling component as well.

Yes, sir.

That is offered in a separate kind of compartment, if you will.

So we partner with Culinary Concepts on a number of things, and they are ServSafe certified trainers.

So they have the ability to offer that additionally.

Thus far, the folks that we worked with have been ServSafe certified already because

they've gone through some other type of program and they understand and we have been working with some that are existing businesses and so they had to have it as a requirement to get their business license or to start working in their business.

So,

So this grant helps us actually to start get going.

We are still raising funds because we still need to raise operating capital as well.

We have just gotten our plans from Mike Stonekean, who's the architect that's supporting us on this project.

And we've gotten those over to the

the construction organization that we're seeking to work with to get a quote.

So when we first started this, it was in the height of the pandemic and so the numbers we got were mind-blowing and so we are very, very hopeful that what we get back now is going to be a lot different, but also that we will be able to value engineer it.

We've applied for a number of grants.

We also have a grant outstanding right now with USDA that allows for us to do specific work with farmers as part of what we're doing because we really want to make sure that we are purchasing the right type of equipment that's going to help with some of the needs that they may have, especially as it relates to the different crops.

And so there's going to be a study that will be done around that.

Any other questions?

Can you show us the resolution again?

Is that what you're looking for, Dave?

I've got the spinning wheel that my computer is speaking.

So forgive me, it will take a moment for me to pull up that language.

I think it's attachment 6B in the meeting materials.

So.

Let me ask just one question then.

It sounds like a great project and I think it has great promise as well.

But it does appear to be in the, you're still sort of in the fundraising stage and it's somewhat speculative as a result.

So the short answer is yes that when the grant, and so the longer answer is when the grant is issued and when it's received by the grantee, they have to sign a receipt that requires that the funds be applied for the purposes of the grant.

They also have to account for it, and there is a provision where they will have to pay it back if it doesn't go towards that.

Great.

OK. Is there a second?

I'll second the motion.

OK. Any further discussion on the motion?

All right.

Director McNaughton.

We didn't lose Steve, did we?

We did.

We did.

Director Mottola.

Aye.

Aye.

Great.

All right.

The resolution is approved.

Thank you, Yolanda, for coming and presenting a great project for us.

I look forward to hearing how it goes.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

Thanks.

OK, next on the agenda.

is the director's report.

Yes.

Thanks, Mr.

Chair.

I hesitate to share my screen any further.

So I'll just verbally report in Roger's absence, just a couple of quick highlights.

I'm going to turn it over in just a moment to Richie to talk about next month's meeting, which we anticipate will be in person in room 241.

Richie will talk about the remote participation policy.

But before that, did want to share that there was a governor's announcement on July 29th for Potter's Craft Cider.

They were the recipient of an AFID grant, which the county anticipates matching for $50,000.

The grant will facilitate

The expanded production, you'll recall the last AFID grant we did with Potter's Craft was for a tasting room on Route 29 South with the renovation and adaptive reuse of the historic structure at Neve Hall.

This AFID grant is focused on expanding their production.

The performance agreement will require that they triple production, purchasing 1.5 million apples over the next three years.

They're committing to eight new jobs and at least $900,000 in capital investment.

Right now there's not an event which we have done in the past with either the Secretary of Agriculture and or the Governor.

That's not planned currently.

The space is currently under construction, under heavy construction.

And that may come at a later date, but wanted to make the authority aware that we anticipate bringing forward a performance agreement at the September meeting.

for the county's local match for this.

J.T., it says relocating and expanding.

So are they, they'll be producing the cider exclusively at this spot simply because it gives them more room

and it was shifting the whole operation in a sense.

That's right.

They currently lease space on a farm and free union and this will allow them to come into the development area and they're committing to tripling their production in the performance agreement.

It may be more than that ultimately.

That will continue to be used as it's currently operating.

The timing of the governor's announcement was enough of a push to get that site completed just before the pandemic really started.

And the event space has enabled Potter's Craft to continue to grow their brand.

and so their distribution has always been outside of the region but it's expanding its reach beyond North Carolina and D.C. and Maryland even further across the mid-Atlantic.

So the event space has really driven that growth and it will continue to remain operating that way.

Good, thank you.

Any other questions before Richie talks about the remote participation policy?

All right.

This will just be by way of a refresher.

I feel like maybe I'm kind of, you know, leaving all at the altar because we expect it to have this policy up today and to be adopted.

But what we couldn't foresee was delays from the FOIA council.

They just put their training online today and I went through that.

So that's going to prompt some changes to the policy.

and that may have had an effect with the Board of Supervisors in considering the remote participation in all virtual meeting policy.

The Board of Supervisors is scheduled to look at that tomorrow so because of those reasons we have to delay considering our policy and I think that's prudent.

So what I will do after tomorrow's meeting, if there are any changes that come to our draft, and I have circulated a draft to all the members, I don't know if I've gotten that to Matt and Jeff.

If I haven't, then I will do that with the changes.

but we're still on tap to approve a remote participation policy and that's for if you have to miss the meeting or can't be at the meeting for the in-person meeting for personal or medical reasons and then also an all virtual meeting which is its own separate piece but those two policies will be up for consideration at the September 20th meeting because we recognize that there may be some members who don't want to

meet in person because of the ongoing COVID and the pandemic.

Our plan is for that after we establish a quorum to take that up as the first item.

So if you feel that you have to miss the next meeting for either personal reasons or for medical reasons,

that I do encourage you to be in touch with Mr. Long, also staff.

And so then if the body adopts the policy on September 20th at the first item, then we can go ahead and consider remote participation at that point.

So there might be some minor tweaks to the policy after the board meets tomorrow and after the attorneys in our office consider what has been

What has been suggested by the FOIA council, but I don't think they'll be major and I'll circulate those and we will consider this first thing September 20th and if you need to take advantage of it, we will accommodate.

Okay.

Thank you, Richie.

Unless something changes drastically tomorrow in front of the Board of Supervisors, which I don't anticipate our next meeting will be in person.

Okay, great.

Unfinished business.

Yeah, thanks.

Thanks, Mr.

Chair.

There's really no new information or detailed presentation to provide other than

Back in the early part of the summer, we identified some ambiguous language about whether or not the building reuse grant would be eligible within the limits of the town of Scottsville.

And so to make that clarification on the front end before the policy was formally adopted, we went ahead and specifically called out that the grant would be available within the development areas or within the town of Scottsville.

and that was approved by the EDA and approved by the Board of Supervisors at their meeting on July 20th and so now we're just bringing it back one more time to adopt a resolution to formally approve the policy and that will allow staff

the direction to move forward with creating an application and to begin the process of soliciting applications.

So included in the meeting materials for tonight is a resolution to formally approve the policy.

All right, any questions?

J.T.

?

Thank you.

Is there a second?

I'll second it.

Mr. Shreve?

All right, any further discussion?

Director Ray?

Aye.

Director Shreve?

Aye.

Director McNaughton is absent now.

Director Mottola?

Aye.

Director Lawless?

Aye.

All right.

Thank you.

Thanks, J.T.

No, just welcome again to our new EDA directors.

And as Richie alluded to, the transition back to in-person will probably include a lot of communication from our office.

So just appreciate everybody's attention to emails and communications coming from us as the September 20th meeting date approaches.

Okay, great.

Anybody else?

Ashley, Megan, anything you guys want to add?

The County Executive's Office, anything?

All right.

That sounds good.

All right, then we will be adjourned until September 20th.

Thanks, everybody.

Appreciate the...

Good night.

Bye.

Bye.